Metropolitan areas around the three major cities have undergone heavy population growth. Some once smaller cities and towns such as Stamford, Greenwich, and Middletown have become centers for industry themselves, taking on new importance as core areas. Town lines have not changed at all during this period, and resources are no greater, but much valuable farmland has been taken over for housing, roads and industry.

As part of this population shift into suburbs and rural areas, the automobile has come to play an enormously enhanced role in people’s lives. It affects where people live, and there have been great changes in commuter patterns in Connecticut since 1950, as well as where and how people shop. At the beginning of the period, a few small shopping centers existed outside settled areas, while today, the automobile has led us to abandonment of older shopping centers in the middle of cities and towns in favor of patronizing the clusters of stores built between towns, with acres of parking lots. In the 1980s, the suburban shopping mall a complex of stores under one roof have proliferated, with major new malls in West Hartford, Milford, Farmington and Enfield. Older shopping areas in town centers, along with specialty shops and department stores in downtown sections of cities have been seriously hurt by the growth of malls. Residents of suburban towns are much less likely than formerly to venture into the city downtown on shopping trips, when it is easier and more convenient to drive to a mall. New Haven and Hartford have attempted to use multi-purpose civic centers as magnets in downtown revitalization with a fair degree of success, but the older style ‘downtown’ has faded away. Small neighborhood stores in cities and small towns have been driven out of business by the malls, and if they are replaced at all, it has been by national chains or franchised outlets.15

Suburban movement has also been a part of ethnic change in Connecticut since 1950. In that year, Italians and Poles were major foreign born groups in the state, and tended to concentrate in the cities. See Unit XI, Appendix A for a nativity chart; Unit XII deals extensively with the New Haven Italian population. These ethnic enclaves have been diluted as children and grandchildren of the foreign born have moved to the suburbs for better housing, better schools and greener grass. The stereotype of the little Connecticut Yankee town; on the surface at least may be found in many parts of the state, but housing developments are often not far away, and an examination of mail boxes shows that younger ethnics have sharply altered the composition of the population.

Black communities have existed in many towns in Connecticut since colonial times. Between 1950 and 1960, non-white population grew from 53,000 to 107,000, as Connecticut shared with other northern industrial states in the migration of southern rural blacks seeking jobs. It was estimated that in 1960, fewer than ten percent of the total of blacks lived outside the four major cities.16 In 1980, it is estimated that between one quarter and one third of the population of Norwalk is composed of minorities.17 Since the middle 1970s, blacks and Puerto Ricans have made up more than half of Hartford’s population.18 It is also possible that final 1980 census figures will show that minorities make up almost half of New Haven’s population. There is a clear concentration of minority groups in cities, especially in the three largest Hartford, New Haven and Bridgeport.

Spanish speaking people, primarily Puerto Ricans, began coming to Connecticut in appreciable numbers during the 1950s to work in tobacco fields of the Connecticut Valley. Conditions changed in tobacco and employment declined, but drawn by job opportunities, large numbers of Puerto Ricans moved into Connecticut cities after 1965. Spanish speaking people now represent a sizeable portion of the nonwhite minority, a minority within a minority. Differing language and social customs have raised barriers to assimilation of the Puerto Ricans, and have led to creation of bilingual programs in urban schools.

School populations for 1979 in the three largest cities show heavy concentrations of minorities. The minority population of Hartford’s public schools is 83.2 percent, all but less than one percent black and Puerto Rican. New Haven’s public schools had a minority population of 76.6 percent, and Bridgeport’s schools had 70.9 percent minorities. But 119 small towns, so classified by the State Department of Education survey, showed a minority school population of approximately three percent.19

The idea of Connecticut as Yankeeland has faded since 1950, as ethnics and minorities have moved into almost all aspects of life in the state. Concentrations of ethnics and racial minorities still remain, but suburban movements in the state since 1950 have had an overall homogenizing effect.

Changing technology

Connecticut’s industry was prospering in 1950, but sizeable portions of it were quickly becoming obsolescent as technology moved ahead faster than the thinking or policies of our conservative businessmen. The manufacturing industry had a very early start in Connecticut, and much of the plant capacity was becoming out of date. During World War II and the Korean War, defense oriented industry, grew into even heavier importance in the economy of the state.
Submarines from Groton, pistols from Hartford, rifles from New Haven, forgings from Bridgeport, as well as brass and rubber products from the Naugatuck Valley towns, played major roles in arming America during those wars. Today, (1980) Connecticut has a higher per capita defense production than any other state. Approximately twenty-seven percent of Connecticut’s industrial output comes from defense related industries. As a result of this concentration, part of our industrial sector has kept pace with high level technology. Many of the defense oriented companies are tending toward non-defense products in order to diversify their incomes.20

Most textile factories, on the other hand, have long since departed for other places, leaving eastern Connecticut with a wide scattering of abandoned mill buildings either being put to other uses or moldering where they stand. General manufacturing jobs have been reduced more than fifty percent since 1950, while there has been a major growth in jobs within technical, professional and service areas.21 The brass industry has fallen on hard times, but helicopters and nuclear submarines now make up a substantial component of industrial production. The typewriter industry is almost gone, but aerospace and nuclear engineering flourish.

Agriculture has followed a trend toward large scale units and increases mechanization. There were 15,615 farms in Connecticut in 1950, while latest figures show approximately 4,000 farm units in the state. In tobacco farming 19,200 acres were in production in 1950, but only 3,200 by 1978. Dairy operations and shade grown tobacco have moved from a large number of family farms to a few large corporations with most of the production.22 One large scale effort in extensive mechanization of vegetable farming is underway in parts of Bloomfield and Windsor by the Newfield Baggot Corporation. Culbro Corporation has diversified from growing shade tobacco into raising nursery stock, land development, and construction.

Major growth in production has been with corporations such as Xerox in office equipment, United Technologies in jet engines and helicopters, General Dynamics in nuclear submarine construction, and Combustion Engineering in nuclear and conventional power generating equipment. Each of these companies has facilities in many different places, and does business all over the United States. The insurance industry has surged ahead in a rapid expansion, making massive use of computers, and hold vast investments all over the world. Each of these industries and others as well are involved in a rapidly expanding, technologically based series of products, in keeping with Connecticut’s tradition of high skill products. However, with automation, fewer workers have been required, but the workers need greater skills. The kinds of jobs young people used to start with in industry are many fewer than in 1950. Educational requirements are higher today.

Since 1950, Fairfield County has become a favorite locale for home offices of large multi-national corporations. Or twenty-nine corporations in Connecticut with assets of more than one billion dollars, sixteen are in Fairfield County.23

A chance to build a new corporate headquarters, availability of land, a desire of corporate executives to relocate near their homes, a desire for a better working environment, and no state income tax have been factors contributing to this movement. Nicknamed ‘the Gold Coast’ because of its affluence, much of Fairfield County is oriented toward New York City, and the use of trains as commuter transportation is heavy, in contrast to the rest of the state. A considerable internal commuter traffic has also been generated in Fairfield County because of the buildup of corporate headquarters there.24 In 1980, Union Carbide Corporation opened part of its new headquarters building near Danbury on four hundred acres of land, a facility which will employ some four thousand persons when completely occupied.

Young Workers moving into Connecticut’s job market of the 1980s will find many fewer unskilled entry level jobs compared to those available in 1950. Skilled and technical jobs are regularly available, but only for the educationally prepared. Unemployment levels in Connecticut have been below the national averages during the 1970s, but young people must accept that job requirements now are higher than they were, and are likely to go higher.

Transportation developments

Transportation in Connecticut has undergone an enormous change since 1950. In that year, the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad was an imposing economic unit and a power in the state, but its great days had already passed. During the 1950s and 1960s this railroad underwent struggles for control among several groups of executives, proxy fights, bankruptcy and receiverships until it was absorbed by the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1969, and even then confusion continued. The story of railroads in Connecticut after 1950 is generally a sad one, as mismanagement, a fiscally irresponsible past, sheer stupidity, and a rapid growth in the number of cars and trucks caused a dramatic shrinkage of railroad mileage, generated a trail of abandoned railroad stations, and reduced passenger traffic to a vestige of its former self. Completion of the Connecticut Turnpike in 1958, and the floods three years earlier were crushing blows to the already staggering railroad.25

Ownership of railroads and bus lines by the government is casually regarded today, but amid Cold War fears of 1950, there seemed to be a real threat of socialism or communism in a government taking over transportation from private enterprise. As railroads declined, the Connecticut Transportation Authority was formed in 1963, charged with subsidizing and maintaining commuter operations between New Haven and New York. In 1967, the Commission’s authority was extended to busses, and the area it covered extended. Conrail and Amtrack are federally funded corporations for policy, personnel, and financing.26 Government is deep into Connecticut’s transportation.

Greatly spread out housing patterns, changing job distribution and the growth in number of private cars since 1950 with more than two million vehicles now registered in Connecticut led to a long range drop in use of passenger trains and busses. Despite efforts by the state to abate taxes on property and offer direct subsidies, dozens of bus runs and railroad branch lines have been abandoned. Mass transportation became a victim of the times, except in Fairfield County. State efforts have been directed toward construction of a highway system and expansion of airport facilities, with railroads and busses winning relatively little.

A lingering but nearly fatal blow to railroads came with the two floods of 1955, each generated by a hurricane. These floods, occurring in August and October, smashed railroads, but they were a major stimulus to environmental awareness, and gave impetus to regional planning by the state. The August floods resulted from massive rains (up to twenty inches in one day) from the stalled hurricane Diane. This great volume of rain had ruinous effects on small streams in the central, northern and eastern parts of the state, with massive devastation in Winsted and Putnam. The October floods struck some of the same areas, but also wrought havoc in southwestern Connecticut. In each flood, highways, bridges, railroads and streambeds suffered heavy damage. The New Haven railroad, already tottering, suffered many millions of dollars in flood damages.27

Factories damaged by the floods were often abandoned, or rebuilt away from their old locations, on high ground in the suburbs. The damaged state and town highways and bridges were rebuilt in improved forms suited to modern traffic, while railroads rebuilt at a minimal level. The obvious and far reaching effects of the 1955 floods forced people to realize the perils of having all decisions made by individual towns. Water did not understand political boundaries. This realization led directly into a rapid growth of planning in several levels of state government, and an acceptance that a watershed might make a better unit of governing some things that the more traditional towns. Planning reached respectability in Connecticut in large measure because of the 1955 floods.28 With county powers curtailed four years later, economic planning units gained in popularity and effectiveness.

The United States Congress passed an Urban Renewal Act in 1954 which gave greatly expanded federal aid money up to two-thirds of the acquisition and clearing costs for approved projects set forth by cities and towns. Congress passed the National Defense Highway Act in 1955 to establish a national system of limited access highways the Interstate road system. These two laws helped bring about a revolutionary change in the shape and accessibility of Connecticut’s cities, literally changing the face of the state as well as its habits.

By 1960, twenty-five towns and cities in the state had various kinds of renewal projects underway, with New Haven leading the way and Hartford not far behind.29 Even small towns such as East Granby and Washington launched major renewal projects. The usual approach was to file a complete plan for the area in question to gain federal approval and financial support. The property was then acquired, structures demolished, the land cleared, utilities and roads rebuilt according to plan, and the rest of the total plan completed. In Hartford, Bridgeport, and New Haven, urban renewal projects were carried out with strong consideration for location of the interstate highways. Renewal projects of the late 1950s and 1960s resulted in construction of large office buildings, stores, insurance headquarters and other business structures, providing cities with a stronger tax base than before, but removing individual housing from large sections of the city.

Urban renewal, combined with interstate highway construction across already established neighborhoods and industrial areas in Bridgeport, Hartford, Norwalk, and Stamford changed the face of these cities. Public hearings on proposed routes for these highways were held in affected areas, and were often stormy. The highways generally followed a compromise between what might be the best route from an engineering standpoint, and a path where citizen opposition was least and property might be bought most cheaply. In general, highway routes tended to run through areas of poorest housing and most run down industry.

Thousands of individuals lost their homes, hundreds of businesses were destroyed by construction of the Connecticut Turnpike and the interstate highways, and dozens of urban neighborhoods were simply eliminated. These land takings had the effect of ending a period of history as they removed large sections of New Haven, Fairfield, Hartford, Waterbury and other places. Streets and houselots were paved over for highways, interchanges and ramps. This made the inner cities accessible to motorists from the suburbs. It also speeded through traffic, over and around the down town areas, and for some individuals, it got rid of a lot of undesirable housing. Those persons forced to relocate were given help by various agencies of the state and federal governments, but the trauma was severe for many individuals, especially older ethnics whose lives were closely tied with one part of town, or with one street.

In the middle 1950s, the core of most Connecticut cities had decayed as a result of old age, neglect, and a continuing movement into suburbs by active residents looking for a better life. Companies needing new facilities, especially parking for employees and customers, began to look toward the suburbs. Connecticut General Life Insurance Company moved its down town Hartford home office north to Bloomfield in 1957 into a spacious, efficient, and highly attractive building complex. Manufacturing companies who facilities were becoming technologically outdated moved away, and parts of Connecticut cities were abandoned.

Through construction of various interstate highways with ancillary roads and streets, the downtown areas of the cities are readily available to automobile commuters. The private, car, in Connecticut as elsewhere, has become a magic carpet to some other place. Job locations, commuter patterns, and recreational habits have all been altered by the rising dominance of the automobile. Shortly after they were completed, parts of I-91 and I-84 were filled beyond their rated capacities. Routes #2, #9 and #11 shortened the time needed to reach the Connecticut and Rhode Island shore from the center of the state. Plans to extend I-84 to Rhode Island, widen I-91 north, and to build I-291 around Hartford came under heavy attack during the 1970s by an ever-shifting coalition of advocates of mass transportation, those opposed to building more roads, and environmental groups. Energy questions have come to play increasing roles in questioning the wisdom of more highway building following gasoline shortages in 1974 and 1979 which raised doubts about the future of cars.

The sharp rise in jet travel after 1960 has made a major impact on Connecticut. Bradley Field in Windsor Locks is now classified as an international airport, and has undergone several enlargements since 1950. Brainerd in Hartford, Trumbull in Groton, and Tweed New Haven airfields handle jets regularly. Every part of Connecticut is within easy reach of every other part by car but not by bus or train. Urban sprawl, air pollution, increasing use of state parks and beaches, ever thicker traffic jams around cities during rush hours, weekend crowding at vacation resorts, gleaming suburban industries, still decaying city cores and neon lighted fast food outlets are all facts of life in Connecticut today. What will the 1990s be like?

Our people are more mobile today than ever, gas shortages, high prices and all. In many ways, the rise of the private automobile has helped integrate sections of the state on the surface, at least. Commuter patterns are greatly different now than in 1950. The kinds of jobs people hold are different, and where they work is as likely to be suburban as city. Television now plays a major role in communication and entertainment, and becomes a whole way of life for some persons. What was life like in Connecticut in 1950, when there was only one television station in the whole state?